picture yourself building a website with joomla! 1.6[electronic resource] step-by-step instruction for creating a high-quality, professional-looking site with ease

Picture Yourself
Building a Website
with Joomla!
®
1.6:
Step-by-Step Instruction
for Creating a High-Quality,
Professional-Looking Site with Ease
Robin D. Turner and Herb Boeckenhaupt
Course Technology PTR
A part of Cengage Learning
Australia, Brazil, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Singapore, Spain, United Kingdom, United States
© 2012 C
ourse Technology, a part of Cengage Learning.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this work covered by
the copyright herein may be reproduced, transmitted,
stored, or used in any form or by any means graphic,
electronic, or mechanical, including but not limited to
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and retrieval systems, except as permitted under Section
107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without
the prior written permission of the publisher.
Joomla!
®
is a r
egistered trademark of Open Source Matters,
Inc. in the United States and other countries. All other
trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
All images © Cengage Learning unless otherwise noted.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2008932480
ISBN-13: 978-1-59863-814-1
ISBN-10: 1-59863-814-9
Course Technology, a part of Cengage Learning
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Visit our corporate Website at cengage.com.
P
icture Yourself Building a Website
with Joomla!
®
1.6
R
obin D. Turner and Herb Boeckenhaupt
Publisher and General Manager,
Course Technology PTR:
Stacy L. Hiquet
Associate Director of Marketing:
Sarah Panella
Manager of Editorial Services:
Heather Talbot

Marketing Manager:
Jordan Castellani
Acquisitions Editor:
Megan Belanger
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Karen A. Gill
Technical Reviewer:
Ryan Fidler
Copy Editors:
Mike Beady, Karen A. Gill
Interior Layout:
Shawn Morningstar
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or product information and technology assistance,
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Printed in the United States of
America

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 13 12 11
eISBN-10: 1-5986
3-833-5
We dedicate this book to Smokey, one of our cats, who went
“Angelical” during the writing of this book.
He was a beautiful, loving, affectionate, and special cat. He will
never know how much he will be missed and how much his loss,
and the manner in which he died, has affected our lives.
Smokey, this book is in your memory.
iv
When one sets out to write a book, writer’s block immediately enters the picture. Our
process for overcoming writer’s block was to go to the golf practice range. While we were hitting golf
balls, the topics to include and how to include them became much clearer. So first, we would like to
thank Mike, Bob, and Maryanne at Carolina’s Golf Mart for the hours they put up with us and enabled
us to overcome writer’s block one bucket of golf balls at a time.
Next, we would like to thank Jennifer Blaney, who first gave us the opportunity to write this book. We also
thank Megan Belanger for being patient with us as the software release date was postponed months at a
time. Megan, we are finally finished, a year later! We hope your new massage therapy career is lucrative.
We also sincerely thank Ryan Fidler, our technical editor, who read through every draft, following each
exercise step by step to make sure the language was clear, correct, and understandable. He is a great
programmer and has acquired a high level of Joomla! skills. He had “our back” on every page of the
manuscript. Thank you, Ryan.
We also thank the many behind-the-scenes people at Cengage Learning, who proofread, prepared the
layout, and helped bring this book to fruition. Karen Gill was a rock as we plowed forward. We also
thank Mike Beady, who provided editing support in the final stages.
Finally, we want to thank our cats for their patience as they walked across our keyboards, laid in our
laps, snuggled up next to our keyboards as we typed, and entertained us with their “chase me, chase
you” antics, which kept us laughing and provided us with the mental breaks we needed.
We humbly and thankfully acknowledge all of you.
Acknowledgments

v
About the Authors
Robin Turner is a program head and instructor of accounting and economics at Rowan-Cabarrus
Community College. She has 25 years of teaching experience at both the university and community
college levels of higher education. She has authored print and digital educational support materials for
more than 25 college accounting texts and has been a reviewer of an unknown number of business and
economic college-level texts.
Robin has received several teaching excellence awards, was a nominee for the R. J. Reynolds North
Carolina Excellence in Teaching Award, is a five-time winner of Who’s Who Among American Teachers,
and has distinguished herself and provided training in 21st Century Learning: Hybrid & Blended Courses—
Bringing Web 2.0 to your classroom, blended or hybrid courses.
Robin received a 2009 Distinguished eLearning Educator Award, appointed by the Instructional
Technology Council (ITC), among others. She has received awards for Phi Theta Kappa Outstanding
Advisor, Phi Theta Kappa Horizon Advisor, State Council of Higher Education of Virginia Outstanding
Faculty Award nominee, and Outstanding Faculty Among Students.
In her spare time, she cooks, makes candy to die for, reads mystery novels, gardens, and golfs with her
spouse.
Herb Boeckenhaupt had a background in the printing and graphics business for some 35 years
in Maryland, serving clients in the Washington, DC, area. He retired from that business in the late 1990s
just as the Internet was emerging. Following the sale of his business, he became a full-time Website
designer and developer and has helped hundreds of clients over the past 12 years.
Herb’s Joomla! involvement began soon after Joomla! was “invented” from the Mambo platform. Shortly
after that, he narrowed his focus and built Websites only on the Joomla! platform. His expert knowledge
of Joomla! 1.0, and then Joomla! 1.5, was channeled into the Joomla! 1.6 version as soon as it was released
in early beta form.
In 2010, Herb brought this expertise to the North Carolina Phi Beta Lambda organization and developed
a Website for the chapter at Rowan Cabarrus-Community College and the State organization’s Professional
Division. He was recognized as the North Carolina Businessman of the Year by the organization. He also
built the Joomla!-based Website for the local battered women’s support organization as a pro bono
volunteer.

Herb volunteers as a member of the Information Technologies and Web Technologies Advisory
Committees at Rowan-Cabarrus Community College. He also builds Moodle courses and recently
completed courses for Emergency Action Planning for 60 high-rise buildings in New York City.
Robin and Herb operate the 200mph Media Group, LLC, and their Website is located at
www.200mphmedia.net.
vi
vii
Table of Contents
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii
Chapter 1
The Basics: Installing Joomla!. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Downloading the Latest Release . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
What You Don’t Need to Do. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Contribution to Joomla! Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Unpacking of the Download . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
A Better Way to Unzip Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Requirements for Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Domain Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Hosting Service. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
The DNS for Your Domain Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Your Own Server. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
MySQL Database. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Username and Password for Database. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Before You Install Joomla! 1.6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
FTPing Files to Your Hosting Location. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Creating a MySQL Database . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Assigning a User to the Database . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Two Ways to Install Joomla! 1.6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Method 1: Install in the Root Directory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Method 2: Install in a Subdirectory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

viii
Seven Easy Steps to a Successful Install . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Step 1: Select a Language for the Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Step 2: Let the Program Perform the Preinstall . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Step 3: Review the License Agreement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Step 4: Configure the Database . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Step 5: Configure FTP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Step 6: Configure the Main Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Step 7: Delete the Installation Folder. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
ISP-Hosted Preconfigured Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Chapter 2
Fast Track Start . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Start Right Now . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
How Content Is Organized. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Creating a Category . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Creating an Article . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Article Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Featured Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Creating a Menu Link Item . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Chapter 3
Default Joomla! Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Accessing the Admin Back-End . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Admin Control Panel. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Use the Drop-Down Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Site Drop-Down Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Users Drop-Down Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Menus Drop-Down Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Table of Contents

ix
Reminder: The Default Content Must Be Installed . . . . . . . . . . 37
Menu Manager Drop-Down Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Content Drop-Down Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Components Drop-Down Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Extensions Drop-Down Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Help Drop-Down Menu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Joomla! Extensions Defined . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Articles in Categories and Modules in Articles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Content Generated by Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Extensions as Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Visit the Sample Content Pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Front Page Layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
What Are Modules? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Anatomy of the Front Page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Types of Content Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Changing the Front Page Content Area Layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Changing the Front Page Article Arrangement. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Chapter 4
Joomla! Website Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Determine Your Website Objective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Decide on the Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Plan Your Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Define Content Type Formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Generate Content via Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
Generate Content via Modules. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Add New Content. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Get There from Here . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

The Main Menu and the Home Link . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Other Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
New Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
x
Remove the Sample Content from Your Website. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
View Content and Visitor Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Register—or Not . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Designate Menus to Specific User Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Chapter 5
Content Management Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Brief Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Articles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Article Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Option Parameters in Detail. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Articles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Category. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Blog/Featured Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
List Layouts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Text Filters, Permissions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Overriding the Global Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
The Content Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Editors Are Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Installing a New Editor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Content via Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Content via Modules. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Using the Editor to Create Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Table of Contents
xi
Chapter 6
Extension Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Using Extensions as Needed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Using Open Source Extensions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
Noncommercial (Free) Extensions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Commercial Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Downloading and Installing Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
Configuring Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
In the Module Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
In the Plug-In Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Making Extensions Display. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
Chapter 7
Component Basics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
Default Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
Installing Additional Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Download the Extension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Install the Component Extension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
What Components Should You Add? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Overkill! There Oughtta Be a Law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Chapter 8
Module Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Obtaining Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Installing and Positioning Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Study the Module Manager. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124

Stacking Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Creating Duplicate Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Using Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Module Class Suffix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Chapter 9
Plugin Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Default Plugins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Obtaining and Installing Plugins. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Using Plugins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
Chapter 10
Template Basics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Template Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Obtaining Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Installing Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Module Positions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
The Default Home Page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Modifying Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
Template Overrides. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Chapter 11
Image Basics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
Static Versus Animated Images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
What’s in a Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Templates Contain Most Images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
Images in Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163
How to Use the Media Manager. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
Images in Galleries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Images in Specialty Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

Images and Screen Resolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
xii
Chapter 12
Form Basics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Default Forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
Obtaining Forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
Installing Forms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
Using the New Contact Form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
Modifying Forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Form Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Selecting Form Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
Forms That Auto-Fill . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Chapter 13
User Management and Access Control . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
What Does ACL Actually Do? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184
Who Can Access What by Default? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
The Default Public ACL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
The Default Manager ACL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
The Default Registered ACL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
The Default Super User ACL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
What Are Actions? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
ACL Has Levels of Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Controlling Viewing Access. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
Understanding Parent > Child Relationships . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
The ACL Configuration Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
Chapter 14
Multimedia Basics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

Multimedia and Extensions in Joomla! 1.6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200
Displaying Videos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Limited Video File Upload Size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
Table of Contents
xiii
Chapter 15
The Joomla! Menu System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
The Default Top Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
Using Menu Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
Hide the Module When . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Chapter 16
Additional Content Topics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
The Joomla! Core Versus Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
The Extension Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 222
Setting Publishing Dates for Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Nonactive Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
Using Trash to Delete Content. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
Permanently Deleting Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
Chapter 17
Advanced Topics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
What You Need . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
Tableless Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Using Class Suffixes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
Other Display Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Page Display Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Link Type Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Changing Terms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236

Using Template Overrides/Alternative Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Using Fonts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238
Adding Languages. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
xiv
Chapter 18
Specialty Extensions for Joomla! Websites . . . . . . . . 241
Social Networking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
Ecommerce Components. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
Membership Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
Combination Extensions for Membership . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
The Joomla! 1.6 Wrapper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246
Scroll Bar Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Advanced Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Forums, Discussion Boards, and Blogs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248
Galleries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249
Classified Listings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
Link Directories. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
Calendars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Reservation and Appointment Systems. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
Real Estate Listings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Document Repositories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
Chapter 19
CSS-PHP-HTML Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
HTML, XHTML, PHP, and CSS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
Templates and Style Sheets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Basics of CSS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Tableless Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
How to Enter CSS Code in Style Sheets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259

Basics of Template Pages. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 260
IDs and Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Style Sheets/CSS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
Table of Contents
xv
xvi
Chapter 20
Search Engine Optimization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263
Joomla! 1.6 SEF Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264
What Is SEO? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
SEO Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266
Joomla! Metadata Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
The Sitemap and Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
The Very, Very Important <h1> Tag . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270
The Reality of SEO and SEO Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271
Black Hat Techniques. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Chapter 21
Web 2.0 Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275
The Look of Web 2.0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
Web 2.0 Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
Building a Joomla! 1.6 Web 2.0–Featured Website . . . . . . . . 276
Facebook, Twitter, and Joomla! 1.6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
Joomla!’s Social Networking Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278
Chapter 22
Site Security and Backups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
Secure the Site. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 280
Security Is More Than ACL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281

Back Up the Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
xvii
Introduction
Joomla! has not been around that long compared to some of the other open source
Content Management Systems (CMSs). But in the relatively short time that Joomla! has been available, it
has made a huge impact in the world of CMS Websites. There are thousands of Joomla!-based Websites
on the Internet today, and the number is growing by leaps and bounds as word about Joomla! circulates.
Joomla! was not created from the ground up as someone’s bright idea. It was derived from another pro-
gram called Mambo. Joomla! actually started as Mambo, which was created by an Australian group in 2002.
As happens with many projects (the Mambo/Joomla! evolution not being the exception), there was a
separation of thoughts on project direction among the participants. The result of this separation of
minds was that Joomla!, which was a near-mirror image of Mambo, found its first release as Joomla! 1.0
not long afterward.
What’s a CMS?
CMS is the commonly used term for Content Management System. It describes a Website config-
ured so that content can be added, changed, or separated from its design, layout, and interactivity.
A CMS separates the Website designer or programmer from the person creating or managing con-
tent. Once the site is designed and is online, the editor or manager takes over and adds content,
which then appears according to the preconfigured site design and layout.
This means that content editors who have little or no experience in Website layout and design can
edit or add content via a user interface or administrator back-end, and the result visually conforms
to the design and layout of the site.
Within that context, Joomla! 1.6 is a true CMS.
How Joomla! 1.6 Arrived
The transition from Mambo to Joomla! was rather
seamless. The Mambo license permitted others
to take the code and start their own projects. In
“open source” parlance, Joomla! is a “fork” of

Mambo that now runs as a completely separate
project with an increasing number of code
differences in the program’s core platform.
As a result of this “forking” by Joomla! from
Mambo in 2005, the headquarters of Joomla!
shifted from Australia to Europe, resulting in a
major ground swell of interest in Joomla! across
Europe as a Website platform that was available
at no cost. Many thousands of Websites are built
on the Joomla! 1.0 platform, mostly for Websites
outside of the United States where Joomla! has
been a little slow in catching on as a Website
development tool. More information is available
on the Joomla! wiki at
/>Joomla! 1.0 has progressed through code
improvements up to version 1.0.15. At that
point, the Joomla! team discontinued support
and shifted emphasis to a completely reworked
package for Joomla! and introduced version 1.5
in early 2008. The changes and enhancements
were plentiful and resulted in a greatly
improved CMS product.
Joomla! 1.5 jumped the Atlantic Ocean and
became more popular on this side of the pond.
Joomla! now has a huge following in Europe,
the United States, and other countries across the
world.
Improvement Was Needed
Shortly after the Joomla! 1.5 release, it became
obvious to the Joomla! core team that some

major improvements were needed to bring 1.5
to a higher level. After examining all the options,
the team members determined that a complete
rework was necessary and proceeded to develop
version 1.6, the current release. They determined
that streamlining of the software was necessary
for today’s Websites and, rather than patching
up 1.5, decided to create a new version.
Extending Joomla! Beyond
the Core Level
Joomla! in its basic form, out of the box so to
speak, has certain core functionalities built in.
The software operates in a certain way and is
somewhat limited in what it can do, given the
method the developers initially chose to set it up
for operation. This is only natural because the
whole idea is to provide a platform with core fea-
tures upon which other developers in the open
source community can build. And they do, as evi-
denced by the thousands of extensions that are
available for the 1.5.x version and that are now
becoming readily available for the 1.6 version.
What makes Joomla! such a great CMS is the
manner in which you can enlarge and extend
its functionality. This is accomplished through
Joomla!-compatible extensions, which fall into
a few basic categories:
Ǡ Components
Ǡ Modules
Ǡ Plugins

Ǡ Libraries
Ǡ Templates
Ǡ Languages
xviii
Types of Websites You Can Build
One of the major features of the Joomla! 1.6
CMS is its function as a solid platform upon
which any number of Website formats can be
constructed. This is accomplished through the
implementation of templates and extensions.
You can use templates to change the Website’s
look. In fact, you can assign different templates
to different parts of the Website to give each a
distinct appearance. This neat trick is discussed
in Chapter 10, “Template Basics.”
Although the terms may not be exactly clear to
you right now, templates are typically spoken
about as different elements of a Website, other
than those features added through regular
extensions. Templates are actually extensions
tried and true, but when discussed in this book,
they may appear to be separate Website ele-
ments. Keep that in mind when you run across
what appears to be conflicting statements.
Templates are extensions, but due to their spe-
cial use, they are sometimes discussed without
associating them with general extensions.
Building Your Site with
Extensions
By using extensions, you can change the entire

site’s purpose. Let’s say you install Joomla! as a
general content site, but you want to use it for
blogging. You do this by adding an extension to
the basic install. Extensions come in many forms,
both free and commercial. Some you don’t pay
for, and others you do. Either way, the core
Joomla! install instantly becomes a blogging site
as soon as you install and activate the blogging
extension. Or you can make it a combination
general content site with a blogging feature page.
Each of these is explained in greater detail in
later chapters of this book, so don’t worry about
what they are or what they do at this point.
Suffice it to say that after reading this book,
following the tips, and doing the exercises, you’ll
have not only a fundamental mastery of Joomla!,
but a working knowledge of the ways to enlarge
its capabilities via extensions.
Improvements in Joomla!
Version 1.6
Joomla! 1.6 has made a number of distinct
improvements over version 1.5.x. Probably the
most significant areas are in content and user
management. These changes were implemented
after the Joomla! open source community at-large
submitted a long wish list of improvements.
The Joomla! core team selected those elements
it determined to be the best ones for the next
release version.
Joomla! 1.6 also has an abundance of improve-

ments that only developers and computer code
geeks understand. This is technical stuff, and
you don’t need to know it to install and run an
efficient Joomla!-based Website, so let’s not
delve into it. You need to know that Joomla! 1.6
is better than 1.5. Let’s just leave it at that for
the time being.
There are a host of other leap-forward improve-
ments in Joomla! 1.6, but rather than reviewing
them here as a comparison to Joomla! version
1.5, our focus will be on the whats and hows of
version 1.6 and how to install, administer, and
use Joomla! to build your Website project and
start adding extensions.
Introduction
xix
The possibilities are endless on the combinations
of extensions you can add that can change the
entire operation and makeup of the Joomla! site.
One thing to keep in mind when looking for
extensions is that several extensions can do the
same thing or something similar. Find out which
one works best for you, but don’t expect the
developers to tell you. These guys (and gals)
are programmers and usually are not good at
product support or help questions. After a while,
you’ll find out which companies or developers
have the best extensions for Joomla!, and you’ll
be looking at their products on a regular basis.
Visiting the Joomla! Extension Directory (JED)

daily can keep you abreast of the latest releases.
The topic of extensions and Joomla! 1.6 compat-
ibility is covered in Chapter 6, “Extension
Basics.”
xx
1
The Basics:
Installing Joomla!
P
icture yourself securing a domain name for your
Website and performing the steps necessary to install Joomla! 1.6,
planning the content, adding articles, and allowing visitors to view
the Website.
Although you might not have pictured yourself working on a Website
server when you decided to create a Website, it’s essential to establishing a
Joomla!-based Web presence. It really isn’t all that difficult, but let’s assume
you have no experience in working with a Website installation on a hosted
or shared server, and we’ll go from there—taking you step-by-step through
the process of installing Joomla! 1.6 properly and putting your Website
online.
Webservers come in different types. Windows and Linux are the most
popular server platforms, but some others that are Linux-like do the same
thing. The one great thing about Joomla! is that you can install it on almost
any server, and most Website hosting companies have servers that will host
a Joomla! Website installation. In fact, many of the larger Internet service
providers (ISPs) and hosting companies have a simple one-click feature for
installing Joomla!, which is discussed near the end of this chapter.
You should know how to install Joomla! 1.6 conventionally on whichever
type of server space you are renting or leasing from a service provider.
Click on the Download graphic and select Joomla!

Version 1.6 Full Package. It may be identified
by another number, such as 1.6.2 or something
similar. If that’s the case, download the highest
numbered version. The download is a com-
pressed ZIP file. You need to save that file to the
Joomla Downloads folder you created earlier.
2
Downloading the Latest Release
Before you start the installation
process,
it’s a good idea to create a separate
folder in the Documents and Settings area of
your computer called
My Joomla, and inside it,
additional folders for
Joomla Downloads, Joomla
Extensions
, and Joomla Templates, shown in
Figure 1-1. This is especially important if you
will be downloading extensions and templates
in the future, which we’ll cover in Chapter 10,
“Template Basics.”
After you have completed this task, the next
step is to download the Joomla! 1.6 program.
You can always obtain the latest version of Joomla!
from the Joomla! Website (www.joomla.org/).
See Figure 1-2 to view the Download button on
Joomla!’s front page.
Don’t Sweat the Installation
Installing Joomla! is the most awkward part

of building your Website. The text covers a
lot of eventualities of installation scenarios,
some of which might not apply to your
server configuration. Still, there are topics
that need to be covered so everyone can
install the program. Be patient when going
through the steps. Installation is really easy
once you understand the process.
Figure 1-1
Create folders to store Joomla! downloaded files.
Figure 1-2
Joomla! Download button.
The Basics: Installing Joomla! Chapter 1
Unpacking of the Download
Assuming you have a computer that operates
under Windows XP, Windows Vista, or Windows 7,
the ZIP file that was downloaded needs to be
uncompressed or unpacked. You need to expand
the file so that all the folders, subfolders, and
files are visible in a standard directory tree. It’s
not difficult to do.
Go to the folder where the ZIP file was down-
loaded (
Joomla Downloads, which you created
earlier), and right-click on the filename. The
expanded menu should look like Figure 1-4.
Right-click on the zipped folder icon, mouse over
WinZip, and select the Extract to Here option
shown as highlighted lines in Figure 1-4. The
unzipping process starts automatically, and the

files are stored in the same folder. Your system
may not have WinZip installed, so look for a
functional item on the list that indicates Extract
or Extract Here as the option to select to unzip
files.
In Windows 7, use the Extract All link when you
right-click, and then select the
Joomla Downloads
folder created in the My Joomla folder of the
Documents Library, or My Documents if using
Windows XP.
Different operating systems have different ways
of extracting files, or accessing the feature to do
so. Check your system help area if the link isn’t
immediately obvious when right-clicking on a
zipped file.
Look for the file ending in
.zip identified as the
Full Package, and select that one (see Figure 1-3).
What You Don’t Need to Do
Notice that during the download process, there
is no need to identify the Website domain name
onto which Joomla! 1.6 will be installed, nor do
you need to go through any sort of licensing or
software registration procedure. Also, it’s not
necessary to obtain an activation code or serial
number to use Joomla!. Joomla! is open source,
which nearly eliminates the need for any kind of
registration-to-use process.
Contribution to Joomla!

Development
Be generous and make a contribution to Joomla!
If, after you install Joomla! and get it working,
you appreciate the work and effort that was put
into the program by the volunteer developers,
why not make a donation to the Joomla! organi-
zation? Your Joomla! 1.6 program is worth a lot
of money on the commercial market, so give a
little back to Joomla!. Look for a link in the upper
corner of the Joomla.org Website to donate if
you are inclined to do so.
3
Figure 1-3
Select the Full Package ZIP file to download.
The contents of the My Joomla folder will be
FTPd (File Transfer Protocol) to your Website’s
location. Transfer the folders and files within
that folder only, as illustrated in Figure 1-5.
A Better Way to Unzip Files
Some servers allow uploading of zipped files to
the host destination so you can unzip them via
the control panel for your domain. Check to see
if you can do that before uploading folders and
files as described earlier via FTP—which does
take a while depending on the speed of your
Internet connection. Moving ZIP files takes less
time, so explore the opportunity to unzip them
via the hosting control panel on your server
after transfer.
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Figure 1-4
You should see something like this when you expand
the folders shown. Your computer may not have the
same unzipping program, or it may just have an
option that says Extract Here, which is the same
type of unzipping process.
Don’t FTP the Zipped File
When FTPing the folders/files to the server,
do not copy the source zipped file from which
Joomla! was extracted. You don’t need it on
the server. However, do leave it on your
system in case you need to unzip the folder
again should a file be corrupted during FTP
transfer. That does happen occasionally!
Figure 1-5
List of folders you should see on the server
after you unzip or extract the files.